Crucifix (10)

Born in Atlanta Georgia, raised in Central and East Africa, Cameron Cruce spent much of his early childhood bouncing from continent to continent, soaking in a wide influence of music, language and culture. By the time he was eighteen, he was native to fifteen different countries, fluent in three languages and understood first hand the harsh reality of living face to face with the third world. But it was his unveiling passion for music that would soon take center stage in his life. At the age of twelve his family moved to Congo where he first began teaching himself to play the piano, writing and producing his very first music. He quickly discovered the power of pouring out his heart into song and within a year found himself recording his first album from the comfort of his bedroom. Making his own tapes with little more than a tape recorder and a keyboard, then designing the covers by hand he began to build a following, selling his music at school and on the dusty streets of Congo and Rwanda. But his life would soon take an abrupt and devastating turn. In April of 1994, the country of Rwanda would break out into one of the worst genocides in history, leaving over a million dead in its wake. Cruce and his family found themselves on the front lines… a broken road of burning cars and mangled corpses the only path between them and safety. With nothing but a Bible in their hands and a prayer in their hearts the family pushed through the chaos, escaping with their lives under a hail of gunfire. Slipping through roadblocks of machete wielding mobs and back roads through dark mountains, the family finally made it safely into the country of Burundi, and began building a new life for themselves in Kenya East Africa. But the images and memories from Rwanda would forever make a lasting imprint on the life and music of Cruce... and in time, music itself would become the only outlet to save him from the silent hurt that was slowly beginning to swell inside.